The traditional process for producing bakery product includes mixing of ingredients, kneading of dough, dividing the dough into smaller portions, shaping and molding of dough pieces, proofing it to a particular volume, and baking. This process is cumbersome, time-consuming, and requires appropriate equipments and qualified bakers for manufacturing for instance a bread with organoleptic characteristics that are typical of freshly-baked bread. In order to minimize preparation time and still provide freshly-baked bread, frozen dough products have gained popularity in food-service, in-store bakeries, as well as home-baking.
Depending on the method of production, frozen doughs are available in different forms. Pre-fermented frozen doughs are proofed before freezing whereas un-proofed or partially proofed frozen doughs require proofing before baking off. Fully fermented frozen doughs (FFF) are fully pre-proofed and do not require proofing before baking off, meaning the production facility would advantageously blend materials and/or ingredients, mix, shape, and fully proof the dough prior to freezing. The receiver of these FFF doughs would then remove the dough from the freezer, place them onto trays and bake them in an oven.
However, the baking potential of frozen doughs decreases with increasing frozen storage time or the number of freeze-thaw cycles. Furthermore, frozen doughs are associated with a deterioration of the organoleptic characteristics of the doughs and the bakery products obtained after baking.
The loss of quality and baking potential can be limited by adjustments in processing conditions, formulation, type of yeast, type of flour and by using additives. Therefore, the frozen doughs described in literature typically involve higher than conventional yeast dosage and/or flour rich in proteins, and/or addition of gluten and/or addition of additives such as mono- & diglycerides, gums, dextrose, fat, chemical leavening agents, ethanol, ADA, etc. All these ingredients are added at concentrations higher than usually used by a person skilled in the art. Furthermore, the use of high amount of yeast together with special flours and additives is economically not viable for a producer.
The methods that require additives involve a process without any fermentation steps prior to freezing or they require a complete thawing phase at controlled temperature before baking. This thawing phase actually corresponds to a proofing step and therefore such a dough product can be considered to be a ready-to-proof product. When a post-thawing proofing step is included in the process the use of dry yeast is not advised.
Typically, it is well know in the bakery sector and by any person skilled in the art that the best quality results are obtained using the freshest yeast available such as for instance liquid yeast or compressed yeast. Some producers develop also new type of yeasts that are suitable for usage in frozen applications, such as “frozen yeast” or “freeze tolerant yeast”. Instant yeast is rarely used in frozen doughs, because it is known to be sensitive to cold shock. Furthermore, frozen doughs require twice the amount of yeast than regular doughs.
Additionally, the market requests more and more to develop recipes with only a small amount or even no incorporation of additives.
The present invention aims at providing new methods for obtaining fully fermented frozen doughs as well as doughs and bread products obtained with such doughs that do not require any additives and allow baking off the fully fermented frozen dough without an additional proofing step.